Tag Archives: argument

I was taking the train a couple of weeks ago. Where I live, the subway is aboveground, so if you want to take a ride, you’ve got to walk up these two flights of stairs to get to the platform. And exactly halfway up, I ran into my old friend Greg, he was coming down the opposite direction, man, I hadn’t seen him in probably like five years, maybe longer. We caught each other’s eyes right away and stopped to say hi.

A lot of the time it’s a pain to have to stop and say hello to someone when you’re just trying to go about your day. But this was different, Greg used to be a pretty good friend, at least for me, this wasn’t your typical “hey how’s it going,” I mean, maybe it was a chore for him, but if it was, he was doing a good job of not letting me know it, trying his best to seem genuinely pleased to see me.

But after maybe fifteen seconds of pleasantries, right after we got the “It’s been such a long time!” automatic intro sentences out of the way, but right before we could really get into any specific “Where are you living these days?” advanced conversation points, this MTA employee comes up from behind me and gives us this really curt, “Listen, you guys can’t congregate on the stairs, OK, you’ve got to move.”

And yes, it wasn’t the ideal spot to catch up with an old friend, but it wasn’t super crowded, and we both made sure to move as far to the side of the staircase as possible. People were going around us. I’m very aware of whether or not I’m causing a traffic jam, and this was definitely not at all impeding the flow of foot speed.

So I kind of motioned to the MTA employee, like I didn’t say anything to him directly, but I made eye contact, I nodded, and then I looked back toward Greg with renewed urgency, like, yes, let’s continue what we’re doing here, but let’s maybe speed it up a little bit, because we are on the stairs, we can’t very well stand here for too much longer.

But the MTA guy wouldn’t have it, he wouldn’t even let Greg and me get in another back-and-forth, I was just about to ask what he was up to these days, but this guy shouts, “Look, I can’t let you just hang out here. OK, you either have to up the stairs, or you have to go down the stairs, but you can’t just stand here on the stairs.”

And I instantly got kind of annoyed, like yes, I know that we shouldn’t be standing here, but this is where this conversation happened to take place, OK, it’s not like I was like, hey, Greg, do you want to get together this afternoon to catch up? Yeah, great, meet me at the Broadway stop of the N train, the Northwest staircase, about halfway up.

Also, I resented this guy’s message, like, here, let me spell it out for you, let me give you one of these long detailed overly worded I’m-in-charge ways of communicating to you what could easily be said in three or four words. So I turned around, I looked this guy in the eye and I said, “Thank you,” while trying not to appear visibly pissed off, like I tried to smile, and I hoped to get the message across that, OK man, I hear you, we hear you, but thank you, now please go back to doing whatever else it was that you were doing before you came over here to start vigorously enforcing the no-standing-on-the-staircase rules.

So Greg and I kind of continued talking, but it was only like a word, maybe two words, because the MTA guy in his orange neon MTA worker’s vest was not having it. “Gentlemen,” he interrupted. And now I thought, OK, this guy’s not going to let up, maybe we should move? But where? Was I going to go all the way back down the stairs? Because Greg didn’t look like he was willing to walk all the way back up. What if one of us made that effort and then the conversation fizzled out? What if it turned out to be nothing more than a heavy initial dose of nostalgia before we both realized, wait a second, there’s a reason I haven’t seen this person in years, it’s because whatever it was that we had in common wasn’t strong enough to sustain a lasting friendship?

And this got me even more annoyed, like what the hell man, you can’t just let two people run into each other and say hi? Can’t you just take a hint? OK? I took your hint, right, you don’t want us standing here anymore. Hint taken. Can you now take my hint and leave us the fuck alone? Just for like a minute? How long do you really think we’re going to stand here? Is it that important to you that we move right this second?

And so I turned my attention from Greg toward the MTA guy, I started giving him the business, throwing out stuff like, “Why don’t you just back off, all right?” and more stuff like, “You’re not a cop, OK? You want to call the cops? Call the cops, because the last time I checked, MTA guys don’t really have too much in the way of actual authority.”

Which, I don’t know what I was going for here, it was a pure reaction. If I was thinking that my display of defiance might have somehow bought Greg and me a little more one-on-one time, I was wrong. Because even though this MTA guy might not have had any actual enforcement abilities, he was still wearing that vest, he still had a few non-arresting powers at his disposal.

Like getting-in-my-face powers, asking me if I was aware that threatening an MTA employee was a felony offense. “Who’s threatening? I’m not threatening?” I shot back with my hands in the air.

At this point Greg started heading down the stairs, “All right man, it was great to see you. Let’s catch up soon!” and I thought about going down with him, continuing the conversation at on the sidewalk, but that was it, the goodbye was said. And would our forced continued discussion be required to talk about the sort-of argument I had just engaged in with this total stranger?

Yeah, that conversation was over, I’d probably never see Greg again, not that it really mattered, not really. I was already feeling that nostalgia buzz start to die down somewhat. And then it was just me and the MTA guy, he was just staring at me, sort of smiling, like, ha, there goes your friend. I just turned and headed upstairs, muttering, “Asshole,” under my breath.

“What was that?” he screamed out after me, I guess I muttered it a little louder than I thought. But just as I considered saying something else, I realized, no, I muttered that exactly as loud as I had intended, just loud enough for him to hear me say it, and now I’ll just slip back into the background of the city, paying no attention to this crazy guy in an orange vest yelling up at some other guy already disappearing into a crowd of people waiting for the N train.

So what, we’re going to stand here all day and argue over who saw this spot first? I saw it first. I’m going head in. Come on man, are we really going to do this? Don’t you think this is probably like the most cliché thing that we could be doing in this parking lot? Because look, I’m not a doormat, all right? I’m not just going to back away. And I get it, you know, I’m not claiming to be the best driver, but I’m a lot better than I was before. I don’t cut people off on the exit ramps, I wait in line. Some people cut right to the front? What am I going to do?

But that’s on the highway. This is a parking lot, and I was absolutely here first. Listen ma’am, this is between your husband and me, OK? So why don’t you just lean your body back inside the car window and stop screaming at me, because you’re not helping. No, you’re making it worse. You’re making me feel like more of a doormat, like you think I’m going to back down just because you’re loud and pissed off?

No, I’m not going to be intimidated. What? Sister, whatever, wife, I don’t know. Just, sir, tell her to get back inside. No, I’m not telling you what to do, well … well I guess yeah, I am telling you what to do. Have your sister shut the fuck up for a second … OK, yeah, that wasn’t right, sorry for cursing at you. Ma’am, yes … OK … ma’am … right, I apologized. I’m sorry for saying fuck. But you see how agitated you’re making me?

Will you stop screaming for one second? Can I get one word in here? Yeah well I apologized for saying fuck, I didn’t apologize for the parking space because, why would I apologize? I had my blinker on as the car before was pulling out. Well it doesn’t matter if you saw me or not, because I was here, and that’s the way you park in a parking lot. You know how long I’ve been looking for a spot? A long time. I’ve been circling and circling like an idiot for like twenty minutes now, Jesus, the amount of time I’ve spent in this parking lot is like double how long it would have taken me if I’d just walked.

Honey, get in the car, honey, you’re not helping. Please, just sit down, please, will you let me handle this? Will you? Hey! Don’t talk to my wife that way! Yeah, well, that’s true, I was a little short with your wife … sister, sorry, right? Anybody ever tell you two you look like husband and wife? That’s not what I meant, it’s just, you know, you don’t really look like brother and sister. Is one of you two adopted?

See? I told you, I could tell. What are you, Italian? And you? All right, OK, I’m just saying, I knew it, you didn’t have to act so offended when I mistook you for husband and wife, you guys must get it all the time. Well, yeah, I guess I’d be annoyed if I was constantly getting mistaken for my sister’s husband.

Hey come on man, how long are we going to keep this up? Because … oh yeah? Well I’m not moving either. That’s what I was just going to say, I was going to be like, because I’m not moving. And I’m not moving. Here you go honey, take the keys, I’ll meet you inside. Fine, well, if this guy doesn’t want to move, I’ll just wait out here, you go eat dinner by yourself, just get me some takeout or something when you leave. I don’t know, order me anything. Just get me anything. Jesus Christ, fucking anything on the menu.

Sorry. I didn’t mean to curse at you. No, I’m not mad at you. I’m mad at this guy. Whatever, if he leaves, I’ll put it in neutral and push it in the rest of the way. Oh yeah, don’t get me any pasta, anything besides pasta. Or chicken. Just go … well, yeah, I guess I wouldn’t want to eat by myself either.

OK, go inside, get takeout, and we’ll eat here. You hear that buddy? We’re staying right here. We’re going to eat dinner right in this half of the parking spot. You want to try me? I’ll stay here all night. And that car behind you, they’re going to come back eventually, you’re going to have to move for them. I won’t budge. I’m just saying, I’ll stay here for as long as it takes. How you feeling? You need to go to the bathroom? Not me. I’m OK for at least twelve more hours.